The Dragon Hero
by SilverStoryMaker11
Summary: A young boy gets captured by mysterious people, and wakes up as a dragon!  His friends Sara and Noah have powers as well, and a funny, yet awesome, adventure begins.  WARNING: Transformation
1. The Crazy Beginning

I am The Dragon Hero. Not many know about me, as I have a secret identity, like most super-heroes. My real name is Zach Alder, but my two friends and everyone else who knows my secret call me "The Dragon" or "Dragon" for short. I have two friends, Sara "Psychic" Billings and Noah "Dash" Cutlingham. "I shall start from thy beginning." as my history teacher says.

I was on a walk with my dog, Zeke, and then he suddenly burst out barking. Then the "Ultra-durable" leather leash broke and Zeke ran off to the right at an amazing speed. I ran off, too, looking for him. Unfortunately, I couldn't catch up, and I got lost. Later he returned to my house, but that's not important now. I walked for almost an hour when these guys from a secret facility deep in the forest, The Infinity, came and took me to their secret lab. They hooked me to a strange machine and turned it on. I was knocked out after a jolt of sharp pain.

When I woke up feeling woozy and my tail ached like heck. _Wait, I have a tail?_ I thought I was crazy. Then I saw my two friends who had been missing for three days, and I realized I must be dreaming. Sara was struggling while strapped to a steel table on my right, and Noah was, and I couldn't believe my eyes, struggling too except at an unbelievable speed, like he had just drank 20 cokes and a candy bar! I _knew_ I was dreaming. I had to be. I would not realize until later how absolutely, positively _wrong_ I was.

When I finally looked at myself, I found that I was a dragon, a six-foot long, dark red, probably fire breathing dragon. I had wings, too. I realized that I would have a new life. I started missing being human. I thought about my mom and dad, and how they would miss me. I thought about my friends in school and in my neighborhood. Then, I thought about myself and my favorite past-times, and then something happened, I felt my body morphing and changing. Soon, I was myself again. Sara and Noah looked at me and said in unison, "Zach!" And I knew it was not a dream, it was too long. I told them about my being a dragon a moment ago, and Noah said, "I got speed. I'm like that superhero, Dash!" And Sara said, "I got psychic powers. Telepathy, telekinesis, mind reading, etc. All of 'em!"

A scientist came in and studied us. He frowned at me and said, "Failed..." then tightened my straps and walked out of the room. I knew what to do, try and change back into dragon form and my size will let me bust out of my tight straps. I focused on the mental image that was formed when I looked at myself. The straps ripped and I walked on all fours over to my friends and used my claws to rip Noah and Sara out of their straps. I turned into human form and we walked down a corridor and curiously opened the door at the end. Sunlight! We ran out and wandered back to the city.

And so, thus began our perilous journey (Or adventure, but who cares?).


	2. On the Roll

There were so many questions buzzing around in my head I was dizzy with confusion. I felt overwhelmed and dumb. Sara and Noah seemed to be handling this just fine, but they didn't turn into a dragon! "Halawhateboo?" I asked them in my most serious tone. I was trying to ask them what was happening, but it came out as twisted as my mind. They both, of course, burst out laughing. I said again, "Whogalatteduh?" And this time it came out different. Why couldn't I speak? Noah fell over and began rolling down the hill, laughing. It was a sorry sight. But it was funny. I tried to laugh. "Buh huh huh huh!" It didn't work. Just then, Noah crashed into a concrete house. Due to his speed, he smashed straight through it! We had to pick our way through traffic and all the police cars and ambulances to get to the other side of the town. Noah was alive and laughing his head off. My voice came back and I asked, "Why'd you go doing that? You caused the city to be in terror, and you destroyed about twenty houses!"

He stopped laughing. "Did I?" He started laughing again. And then, by looking at Sara's face, I could tell she was trying not to laugh either. Their new powers could be more trouble than they thought.

"Well, we can't stay here anymore. We've already been missing, so our parents won't think any different of us." I said. It was true. And we had to go now. Everyone agreed, and so we set off to who-knows-where. Maybe some perfect place like Mars. Ha, I wish! We entertained each other with jokes until nightfall, when we set up a puny camp up in a tree, where we very uncomfortably settled down to sleep.

My dream was weird, as always. I was a dragon again, but I was saving people from fires and destroying gigantic bombs that were to blow up an entire city. A voice suddenly blared, "This is your destiny. You will save the world a thousand times over." it said, "You must travel to Hawaii and defeat the evil warlord, Angus. Good luck, Dragon Hero!" and the dream faded away.


	3. Finally on the Move

I woke up thinking, _What the heck!_ But as I came to my senses, I remembered everything that happened yesterday. Noah and Sara were already awake, and Sara was making branches fall off trees for firewood. She _did_ say she had psychic powers, and she was right. Noah was impatiently cooking some hamburgers that he said he "borrowed" from a nice store back in town. Seeing the hamburgers reminded me of the evil warlord from my dream, Angus. Did it mean the new Angus third-pound burger at McDonald's? That couldn't be right. A burger and an evil warlord aren't the same thing. And why did they have to go to Hawaii? Were they going to take a vacation? Or maybe this is all just a prank, or a figure of my imagination.

Just then, I realized I had a tail again. I turned around and saw my dragon tail, fitted with nice red armor plates all over. I focused on not having a tail, and I felt it uncomfortably suck into my body. Amazingly, my clothes fixed themselves. I looked up and saw Noah grinning at me with the burgers ready and on buns he had "borrowed" as well. Suddenly, he was an inch in front of me, still grinning.

"The hamburgers are ready!" he said, almost as quickly as he moved. Sara put some branches on the fire and put the rest aside. No one spoke while we ate our burgers, as it was so time-consuming to talk. We were all hungry. Sara and Noah hadn't eaten since who-knows-when, and I hadn't eaten since yesterday morning. I checked my watch, with had apparently stayed on my hand the entire time, and realized it was past noon. Hungry and sleepy. We had all stayed in our trees all night, without falling. I was ripping so fast at the burgers that I was almost as fast as Noah, the buzzsaw eating machine. I had grown dragon fangs while thinking about food, and I knew this could be a problem, growing dragon body parts out of the blue, but I couldn't think about it now.

After a very late breakfast, I explained my dream to everyone, and I had the strange feeling Sara was reading my mind to see if there was anything I wasn't telling them. _That could get annoying._ I thought. When I was done, Sara nodded her head, as if she understood everything. Noah just said, "Then lets go!" And so off we went, again. I was kind of excited to become a dragon again. _Soon, I hope._ And soon it was, for _they _attacked on our way to the next city.


	4. The Giant Spiders

The giant spiders attacked. Sara used her psychic powers to create a temporary force field around us as we figure things out. What was happening? Why were those spiders so big? There were 5 of them, but they were huge! Noah started screaming and zooming around in circles, while Sara appeared to be frozen in the act of shielding us. I had the only active sense in here, so I thought about a plan. I could just sit here and wait while the force field slowly disintegrates. Nah, that would mean death. I could sweet talk the gigantic spiders into leaving. No, that would definitely _not_ work. I could turn into a dragon again and fight the spiders. Yes! That was the best idea yet!

Sara got my idea and the force field shut down. Noah stopped moving momentarily to stand with us in that heroic posture. A mysterious land mine blew up behind us, causing that cartoon-ish moment that seems to appear in all action movies and games. We raced into action. Sara lifted a spider up with telekinesis and forced its hairy skin to implode. Wow, I didn't need that. There were guts everywhere and the spiders seemed a little disoriented. She fainted from the power it took to do that. Me and Noah were on our own. Well, just me, because Noah had gone back to that frantic screaming and zooming around in circles. Great, just great.

How could I defeat four giant spiders? Wait, I could become a dragon. And who would care if I died anyways? Time to transform and put this possibly successful plan to action. It felt weird transforming, as if it weren't supposed to happen and it would kill me. Nah, why would that happen? But still, the possibility scared me. Well, it was surprisingly not painful! I mean, it was sickening listening and feeling my bones crunch and rearrange in my body, but not physical pain occurred. It fact, I felt better afterward, stronger and healthier, perhaps? I grew bigger and my muscles became stronger. Then, I grew a tail and my clothes sucked into my skin just as my skin turned black. I got that tough, awesome dragon's head and cool dark red armor plates. I had just realized that being a dragon was awesome. I _did_ feel like I could save the world as a dragon. Thus, I created the name "Dragon Hero" that I later introduced to Sara and Noah, but that doesn't matter. So, I charged, or rather flew, into a hoard of gigantic spiders.


	5. More Spiders and Firebreathing

Wow, flying really takes your breath away. It was amazing having long, wide wings to glide through the air with. It felt like swinging really high on a playground swing, except never going backwards again. Darn it! I forgot about the spiders. And one had flung itself at me and I dodged just in time. It had jumped so high, it fell down to the ground with an almost hilarious shriek of both surprise and fear. It sounded so funny, but when I heard the sickening splat I remembered that fighting like this, alone, was dangerous and serious. _Why wasn't Noah helping me?_ He had gone almost psycho on the ground, still screaming and running around in circles. Sara was still out cold. Right then, Noah smacked a curious spider that got to close. Splat! That one was down. Three down, two to go.

Noah finally realized screaming and running around in circles was not going to save him. I think the splat from the spider he had hit snapped him out if it. "Hey, Zach! How ya doing?" he asked. Man, he's dumb.

"I'm fighting spiders! Isn't it obvious that I need help?" I tried to say. But it came out as a couple of distorted roars and squeaks. Apparently he understood it, or heard it in his head like Sara's creepy "telepathy". He jumped so quickly and so high, that I was shocked. Only my wings flapped in the steady rhythm that kept me aloft. He fell down like a meteor on top of a spider and began punching it in the eyes a hundred times a second. It finally fell down, dead.

I felt excited that I wasn't going to die. But something kept nagging at me, like I needed to know. _Why can't I breathe fire?_ And as I thought about that, I felt a warm sensation in my throat, like a fire burning in it. _A fire!_ I opened my mouth and let it flow out. A stream of orange fire blasted out of my mouth at the last spider. Awesome! It felt so aimed, so accurate! I was protected from the flames by my thick, dark skin. Noah, on the other hand, wasn't protected, and he ran about a mile away as the fire burned the spider and about ten feet around it. When the flames had extinguished themselves, Noah darted to the site where Sara and I lay. I was curled up around her, and she began to regain consciousness.

When we were all awake, Noah dashed off to our town and "borrowed" some more food. He grinned as he speed-cooked, like last night. We set up camp for the night and Sara finally got me to return to human form reluctantly. I felt like being a dragon was something I had to do. I felt so weak and, dare I say it, helpless as a human. We settled into sleep, and for once, this chapter had a calm ending with nothing bad happening.


	6. What Could Go Wrong?

In the morning, we all got ready to go and set out once more. Sara said she could feel the presence of other humans. And Noah got fidgety. I was a bit uneasy, too, considering we were in a "hunter's forest". If I became a dragon in here I could be shot by a careless hunter. Not that it would hurt me, because I had those cool dark red armor plates, but I might be discovered. I don't think that anyone would feel safe with a dragon on the loose, even if I wasn't evil or wild. Noah wanted to check the area to see where we should go, and Sara reluctantly let him. In a flash he was gone. We kept walking in silence, and when Noah appeared out of no where again, he was silent as well.

Later, Noah finally let out what he saw, and it wasn't very comforting: "I saw a purple frog and a slice of cheese in a swamp," Right... "and I saw a _very _convincing candy house, but then I remembered Hansel and Gretel and I ran away," And after Sara scolded him for being crazy, "I saw a huge city only a mile or two away that looked like it had an airport. Don't we need to fly to Hawaii? And I don't think Zach can fly us there very fast. So, what are we waiting for?"

We all agreed to go to the city with Noah leading the way, but Sara and I weren't so sure Noah leading us was a good idea. I had promised myself when I was younger to never say, or even think about it, but I had to let it out. "What could go wrong?" And Sara and Noah both stared at me in shock. The shock changed to horror within seconds. And I felt hot breath on my neck. I wouldn't turn around, I couldn't face the what-ever-it-was behind me. So I told Sara to run. Noah was far ahead of both of us. We ran. On the way I transformed into my dragon form and nabbed Sara by her shirt. I flew as fast as I could to get as close to the city as possible without being seen. Well, I made another mistake today. I just _had_ to say it. "This couldn't get any worse." And even though it just came out as a growl, I caught a glimpse of a giant hawk flying at me. I hit it with fire and it fell down, dead and burnt to a crisp. Great, words really _did_ have power here.


	7. Shopping and the Airport

We made it to about thirty yards away from the edge of the city and then we all stopped to rest and I transformed back to human form. I was really starting to love being a dragon. I had extreme power, I could breathe fire, and I had dark red armor protecting me from fire and almost any kind of physical impact. It's pretty awesome being part dragon. At that moment, resting there near the city, I accepted my new life and the fact I wouldn't see my family again.

Much to Noah's disappointment, we all slowly walked into the town like normal teenagers who had been hanging out in the woods. But we all looked horrible; our clothes were in ruins and our faces were smeared with dirt and smoke. So we stopped at a small store to get clothes with some money that Noah "found". Noah apparently hated shopping, so he picked out a tropical t-shirt and brown shorts along with a pair of ridiculous purple sunglasses. On his way out of the store to wait for us outside, Sara started moaning about how "his colors don't go together at all" and then took careful care in picking out a red and white striped t-shirt and baggy blue pants. Gosh, she looked even worse than Noah! I picked out _exactly_ the same outfit as her and, would you believe it, she screamed and pointed at my outfit, emphasizing how horrible it looked. She looked down at her own outfit and suddenly became calm. I was only copying her, and she let it go. One moment she was screaming about how horrible I looked, and then she was dead calm like it was a perfectly normal outfit.

We continued through the city, receiving terrified looks from anyone nearby. They all knew how ridiculous we all looked, but Sara didn't. We finally found the airport near a huge park. And there was yet another monster in the giant park. It was the biggest wasp nest I've ever seen, and it had 6-inch wasps pouring out and around it. This one was simple. I only transformed my head into that of my dragon form and felt a great, almost unbearable, hot feeling in my belly. I let out a stream of flame at the wasps, but I noticed at the last moment that they had thick metal shells around them, and sure enough, the fire did nothing but infuriate them. I transformed back into fully human and Noah ran into the airport screaming. What a scaredy cat. Sara had the courage to use her telekinesis to kind of brainwash the wasps and they all flew around the hive and actually picked up the one-ton nest and carried it away. I asked Sara what she made the wasps do and she said, "I just simply made them all pick up their nest and fly into the ocean with it and drown, just like that!" and she snapped her fingers.

We all loaded up in an airplane heading for Hawaii and as the plane took off, I recounted the events of the day. I only got to about half of what happened when I realized how late it was and fell asleep next to the already unconscious Sara and Noah. Another day survived, another day closer to my mysterious fate.


	8. I'm Itchy

I woke up completely relaxed. But I had forgotten where I was and why. I started panicking, trying to remember why I was on a plane that said "Hawaii" on the destination bar. Then, right as I was about to wake Sara up and ask her, I remembered. I also realized that Noah was missing. Then I did wake Sara up. She woke in a daze and replied to my question with a sudden complete awakening and a shocked look on her face. She must have been REALLY tired, because her super-powerful brain made her go back to sleep, anyways. And then Noah came walking down the aisle from a small cube that made a distant _flush_. Noah looked completely refreshed, and I just couldn't believe I even wondered where he was. We were on a plane, gosh darn it! How could he go anywhere but the bathroom or his seat?

The plane landed with a jerk and we all woke up drowsy. We came off the airplane and we sat down in the waiting area. I surveyed the busy scene we were in: Many people were walking hurriedly to and from multiple airplanes, most carrying suitcases or briefcases. The airport was fairly fancy. There were even chandeliers every fifty feet! The people kind of messed the rich feeling up, though. We finally got up when we were itching to get up and walk around. I was also itching to scratch my rear end, but I resisted the urge because of all these people who might see.

We left the airport with no idea where we could stay for the moment. I wanted a warm house and bed, but the dragon part of me wanted a cozy cave. I figured I had better go with the house idea, for the sake of the others. We just stood there, outside the airport lobby, for a while. Then a sprinting girl of about eleven slammed headfirst into Noah. He started blasting out cuss words that were impossible to make out over the speed they were said. The girl said sorry, but Noah started screaming in anguish. Then the girl said, "Gosh, you take things too hard. I only bumped into you!" And Noah retaliated with another volley of super-speed cuss words that couldn't be heard because of the speed. I took this time to absentmindedly scratch my bottom and ask why the girl was in such a hurry anyways. This sunk in and she burst out running into the airplane with a look of realization. We followed her and Sara asked her with telekinesis why she was running. That was dumb, because the girl tripped in surprise. Sara asked her again why she was in such a rush, except this time she asked in words. The girl finally got up and replied shakily, knowing we had powers like telekinesis. She was apparently running to tell the boss of the airport to block plane flights and evacuate because an evil guy who could change into a dragon, called Angus.

As we ran along and helped her spread the word about Angus, one word flashed in my mind. Destiny. This was my destiny. Angus is the ultimate challenge for me. Now, it's on!


	9. FART and A New Name

After we helped the girl evacuate and stop flights, she told us her name. It was Kelly. She asked us where we were staying and I said nowhere. And, would you believe it, she said that nowhere sounds like a good place to live. But she was joking, and she asked if we wanted to come and stay at her house. Sara was the first to respond with a yes. So we set off, following Kelly to her home.

When we came to the front gate I knew this was not an ordinary house. One, it was a big, three story building, and two, it had a business's sign on it. The sign said _Fast Acting Response Team, or FART for short._ Noah stole the words off my tongue: "What the heck? What human in their right mind would call their company _FART_?" Kelly just giggled. And we went in, much to Noah's disgust.

Kelly's mom was nice, and she explained that her father ran the emergency crew "FART" and he was helping other people with all the destruction that Angus was causing. He had already wreaked Maui, another Hawaiian island, and now he was here, on the main island. Soon, if he wasn't stopped, he would move on to the rest of the world, destroying everything. Kelly explained all this herself with such power that we all believed that Angus would prevail. Everyone but Noah, for he just wanted to get out there and start beating him up. But it was getting late and Kelly's mom let us stay in the "guest floor", which was the top floor on the building. We got an entire floor to ourselves! We took the circular escalator on the right, the one going up, and lay down in our beds immediately.

I had another weird dream this night. It had the same voice from the original dream that got me into this mess. It said, "You are doing good, Dragon Hero. Keep it up and you will succeed against the terrible threat of Angus." then an image of a guy in his mid thirties who had a jet black goatee and jet black hair popped into my mind. He was grinning with an absolutely evil essence. And the voice spoke again: "Now you believe me, huh? Anyways, you must fight Angus as a human unless you must transform to finish him off. He will only become a dragon in battle if he has to. Farewell, Dragon Hero, and good luck!"

I woke with the image of Angus burned into my skull and he words of the mysterious voice stuck like a tape recording in my brain. Sara was using the fairly fancy bathroom, and Noah was using the training equipment in the corner of the floor to do multiple lightning fast chin-ups and other exercises. I realized that the thing speaking in my dream had called me Dragon Hero. I liked that name. It was more heroic than Zach. I could imagine going right up to Angus and saying "I, Zach, will destroy you!" No way I was doing that. Right then I decided to go by The Dragon Hero for all of my adventures, and by Zach as my undercover identity. Now I feel like a comic book hero. But it feels good to have a good, heroic name like Dragon Hero. Thank you mysterious voice!

When I had told Sara and Noah about my dream, Kelly came up and got us for breakfast. That was the first part of the plan: to eat and lay low for a while. I had a new mission now. And I was determined to finish with success. Say your prayers, Angus, 'cause The Dragon Hero is out to get you!


	10. Into the Creepy Volcano

After breakfast we went outside. Kelly's dad was at breakfast, and we had to hold Noah back from stating his "comments" about his company's name. I told Kelly to stay behind at her house, and we would take care of Angus. She agreed reluctantly and took the elevator upstairs to get our stuff. What little we had was stuffed into a few small plastic bags and we were sent off will many "good luck" messages. Kelly said something in Hawaiian that might have meant, "Goodbye maybe forever." and then they all went into the house one final time.

After we had decided to scale the mountain to spot Angus from up high, we stashed our stuff in a small cave behind a rock and started up the mountain. It was a tough climb. We had no water to hydrate ourselves, so we had to make this whole mission fast. Noah didn't have a problem with the climbing, but he waited for us about ten feet up. I was itching to just become my dragon form and fly up, but I was staying tough on the climb for Sara.

When we reached the top, we were astounded by what we saw. The mountain, however gray and rocky, was really a volcano with a hollow crater at the top! The crater had, after some examination, a long flight of gray stairs leading deep into the crater. These steps would have been almost unnoticeable from even a short distance; they were very narrow and pressed up against the side of the volcano. Sara started descending the stairs first, then Noah and me. They were very extensive, and it took a while to get down them. At the bottom was a silver-colored platform that had a faint arrow pointing to a square section along the side of the chamber.

When Sara used her psychic powers to lift the heavy piece of metal from its position, a ladder attached to the wall of the mountain became visible. We climbed down the ladder and Sara put the piece of metal back in place. I wasn't completely dark, because there was a mysterious red glow coming from down below. I suddenly had a thought that it was lava, but then I realized that no one would put a ladder leading into lava. That would be insane! This all seemed like one of those secret laboratories that were in cartoons and comic books, but now _I_ was the great hero finding his way into the lair of an evil villain like Angus. But none of the cartoons or comic books had a villain that changed into a dragon. I couldn't turn into a dragon because that would provoke Angus to do the same. I was with friends, powerful ones at that, but I still felt anxious. Here, as we descended the mysterious ladder into the ground, I realized that my final battle was coming up. And soon.


	11. When Angus Screams

The ladder was strong enough to support all of us, even with Noah and his fast, jerky movements. The ladder was long. Or tall, however you want to say it. It descended deep below sea level. I could tell this because my ears popped, and there was a strong musky odor surrounding the dirt. And the dirt was getting darker. The ladder looked almost new, however old the chamber was. The chamber must have been made a long time ago by the eruption of the volcano, but the ladder looked like it must have been made and put here just a few days ago. I was glad to have friends accompanying me on this rather strange adventure.

The earth stinks. Stinks as in the smell. Why does dirt have to smell like dead stuff? I even asked Sara, and she said that she saw fossils around us. I felt a little better, and a little worse hearing this. I felt good that I was climbing down a ladder with rare dinos resting in peace all around me. But then I knew that I _was_ smelling something dead. Dead dino.

The glow was getting closer, and it seemed like time was slowing down. Like there was only us, the earth, the ladder, and the glow. And the odor. Then we could all see clearly that the glow is from a machine. And, of course, there was Angus. Just as scary as in my dream. And, just like all other villains from cartoons and comics, he was gloating about what he is going to do. He was saying about how the machine was mining all the valuable minerals and ore from this entire island by sending drones through the earth to collect them. And then he said that he would lower the entire island into the sea and drown everything. How clever! But this is the bad kind of clever. The kind that could end the world. And then we all knew how great the danger was.

We took the stealthy approach: sneaking in past Angus when he went to the other side of the cave/room and turning off the machine. Then destroying the machine and defeating Angus. It might work. But it might not. We would have to see. Sara used her telekinesis on herself to lower herself gently to the giant power switch on the side of the machine. She could not be heard over the rumbling of the machine, but when she turned it off the noise stopped and Angus looked around, startled. He saw Sara, but then she messed up his mind temporarily so that everything looked normal to him and he didn't notice anything out-of-his-kind-of-ordinary. He even started mumbling to himself and then did a faceplant on the floor. And, would you know? He started squirming on the floor, shouting "Hallelujah!". It was hilarious, but you might have to have seen something like that before.

Right as we finished destroying the machine, Angus sat up and started talking in a weird, deep voice. "You are not worthy to be in my presence. I will obliterate you!" Obliterate, huh? Nice vocabulary. And he ran at us, wielding long scythes that appeared out of nowhere.


	12. The Battle Begins

The scythes looked sharp, and I was determined not to get near them unless I was protected by my dragon form's armor. I couldn't transform because that would give Angus the idea to transform into his dragon form, too. And I don't think that would be very nice to fight. So I make an invisible change that could help me greatly: Changing my brain to have the reflexes and instincts of a dragon. That piece of my brain that I added quickly adjusted to suit my human body, and I found myself running on the walls around to the other side of Angus. Then everyone, even Angus, just stared at me in wonder, like I was a ninja or something. And I broke the silence by smacking Angus in the face. That was instinct. When Angus tried to strike back, I did a frontflip over him. That was reflex. This change wouldn't provoke Angus to change forms, and it was very useful.

I was getting so excited... I screamed and ran at Angus with such speed that I was almost as fast as Noah, who did, in fact, get angry at me for "stealing his powers". The adrenaline felt good! So good that I kept striking Angus with my furious fists of... uh, fury? He dropped his scythes before long, rendering him nearly harmless. Well, not completely, but he wouldn't... Oh, yes he would. And he did. He grew taller and changed shape into that of a very ugly, but very strong, dragon with dripping black fangs and claws. He was about twice the size of my dragon form, but something I noticed was that he didn't have any shiny armor plates like mine, just thick, gray skin. That makes things easier. A little. I changed my form completely, so as not to just have the brain of a dragon.

And as we flew out of the cavern, Noah, carrying Sara, ran straight up the wall of the volcano shouting to me. He was saying, "The volcano's gonna blow! Shutting down that machine triggered intense thermal reactions, thus causing the volcano to release a spurt of lava that could destroy a portion of the island!" But he looked possessed, and sounded kind of like Sara, who was unconscious in Noah's arms. Sara was speaking through him while unconscious! That was one of her coolest powers.

I charged Angus with my claws outstretched, giving him a nice gash in his right side. It caused him enough pain that he did not attack me back. He howled in pain, then stored enough power to strike back with a swipe of his claws. The claws wedged just between my armor plates and gave me a painful wound on my neck. I felt like I was about to black out, but I knew that I must keep fighting! Anything to fulfill my destiny and prevent Angus from taking over the island and ruining many unfortunate people's lives.

The final battle has begun... And I will win!


	13. The Final Chapter

Drastic times call desperately for drastic measures. And it was definitely drastic now. So, uh, I guess I charge at him. But then a better idea pops into being. Dragons can't be fireproof on the inside, right? So I get close and take as many swipes of my claw as I can on Angus' right side, where he was hit earlier. Then I muster as much fire inside as I can and let it out on the many cuts I inflicted. The plan works to much extent; he screams (If dragons _can_ scream) and I see black smoke coming from the gashes in his right side. And then Angus falls limp back down into the volcano, where I can see the lava rising up. His body soaks down into the lava, where I assume it will not be seen again. I saved the world. But I can hardly keep aloft in the air with my ruined neck.

When I come to rest on the patio of Kelly's house with Noah and Sara, who is conscious again, examining my painful wounds on my neck. I apparently have many deep holes in my neck, but that is a small price to pay for saving the world. Even so, I find it hard to think any kind of good thought, let alone keep from falling asleep from all the pain. I seem stuck in my dragon form; when I tried to transform into human again it was too painful to continue. Kelly was home, and she came out drowsily, illuminated by the sunset. She screamed when she saw me and stepped back. Sara calmed her somehow, and explained that I wasn't Angus. Then Kelly explained that she had never seen Angus, so she thought I was him.

She got a grip on the situation by calling to her mom, "Mom! Zach defeated Angus and now he's dying on the porch!" Okay... That was not what I'd tell _my_ mom. But she came out nonetheless, and put special herb mixes into my gashes. The pain almost completely left, and I was able to slowly transform into human form once again. When I was human, Kelly's mom put a big bandage over the still visible bloody holes in my neck and Kelly helped me to the couch inside.

Now was the time for celebration! And so Kelly and her mom whipped out streamers and balloons and decorated the place, even adding in "Congrats, Dragon Hero!" on a big banner at Sara's request. And Kelly's dad came home with a pizza and soda, which I had not had for a long time. And we all partied, even Noah, who demanded to see Kelly's dad for a talk about his company's name. And we all lived with Kelly's family until we got enough money to get our own house a few blocks away from Kelly's house. And that's how the story ends. And, of course, I just _have_ to say it because this is the end of a book.

THE END


End file.
